Al Kalifa Troops assault mourners in Bani Jamra

Bahraini regime troops assaulted protesters in the capital Manama on Wednesday after a mourning ceremony for three people killed last week as they allegedly tried to flee to Iran.

(AhlulBayt News Agency) - Hundreds of people took to the streets of Bani Jamra village, shouting slogans hostile to the regime, witnesses said, AFP reported.

The police fired buckshot directly on the crowd, hitting several protesters, the witnesses said, without giving a precise number of wounded.

Three Bahrainis were martyred while attempting to flee outside Bahrain through sea, after an armed confrontation with forces affiliated to the ministry of interior following a naval chase.

The Bahraini authorities buried on Sunday (February 12, 2017) the bodies of the three martyrs in Sheikh Maitham Al Bahrani Cemetery in Umm Al Hassam area, amid tight security measures. The authorities only allowed 2 members of each of the martyr's families to take part in the corpses washing and burial rituals.

A large number of citizens offered condolence to the families of freedom martyrs "Rida Al-Ghisra, Mahmoud Yousif and Mostafa Yousif" in the Imam Zainulabedin Mosque in Bani Jamra on Monday (February 13, 2017).

Since February 14, 2011, thousands of anti-regime protesters have held numerous demonstrations in Bahrain on an almost daily basis, calling on the al-Khalifa rulers to relinquish power.

In March that year, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, themselves repressive Arab regimes, were deployed to the country to assist Manama in its crackdown on protests. Hundreds of Bahraini activists have been imprisoned and suppressed.

On June 20, Bahraini authorities stripped Sheikh Qassim of his citizenship, less than a week after suspending the al-Wefaq National Islamic Society, the country’s main opposition bloc, and dissolving the Islamic Enlightenment Institution founded by Qassim, and the opposition al-Risala Islamic Association.

Over the past few weeks, demonstrators have held sit-in protests outside Sheikh Qassim’s home to denounce his citizenship removal.

Bahrain has also sentenced Sheikh Ali Salman, another revered opposition cleric, to nine years in prison on charges of seeking regime change and collaborating with foreign powers, which he has denied.

Sheikh Salman was the secretary general of the al-Wefaq National Islamic Society, which was Bahrain’s main opposition bloc before being dissolved by the regime.